Sometimes It’s Better

This week the Lord brought me to a difficult epiphany.

I’d been working on a fantasy trilogy for eight years. During those eight years I had moved from one county to another within Ireland, then from Ireland to the east coast of USA, where I moved a few more times still, and then my husband, my daughter and I moved to Texas. In the midst of all that shuffle the major last scene of the book was lost.

You see, I insist on writing all of my first drafts out by hand. And this part never made its way into the computer.

And now it’s vanished.

But the Lord asked me to be thankful for that loss.

My first response was, “Okay, but I’m going to spend the next three hours searching before I do that.”

Again, I felt that gentle nudge in my heart: my King wanted me to me thankful for that loss.

I slumped into a pile of boxes and notebooks, willing myself not to cry, and asked for His help to see what I could be thankful for. Because I was blind to it.

Here’s what He showed me:

Notebooks I found were filled with notes for three more books, books He’d put on my heart to publish this year but I didn’t think I had enough material. Now I have the material.
There were a few scenes in that lost notebook that I wasn’t pleased with. This was my opportunity to make it entirely new, better and the way it should be.
I found prayer journals filled with desperate prayers that I now had the answer to.

Seeing these began an avalanche of gratitude. I’m thankful that even in loss there are things to be thankful for. And sometimes it’s better when you lose the bad writing so you can replace it with the good.

A reminder to myself to always say this.

 

“Give thanks in all circumstances.” 1 Thessalonians 5:18